West Dorset West Dorset

West Dorset, Royaume-Uni, offre des paysages champêtres pittoresques, des villes historiques et la Côte jurassique. Les plats locaux typiques incluent le Dorset apple cake, le fromage Blue Vinny et les fruits de mer comme le maquereau et le homard.

The Elm Tree Inn

The Elm Tree Inn

Shop Lane, DT3 4HU, West Dorset, United Kingdom

Meat • Steak • Cheese • Salads


"This spot is a lovely spot for lunch and it was fully booked on the day we arrived. Drinks arrived promptly and the service was fairly brisk, very friendly This is also a dog friendly pub with several tables bringing their well behaved mutt along. Whilst service was friendly there was no later 'follow up ' to check if everything was ok once the food had arrived and we got stuck in. Really disappointed to find that the tempura cod starter had run out. The lamb and mint coquettes were a little bizarre they tasted of duck not lamb so we did wonder if there had been a swap with the lamb running out and the duck leg being substituted? The sirloin roast beef (in the Sunday Lunch was very well cooked, pink, soft and very succulent. Excellent. The Yorkshire puddings were enormously risen, very dark brown to the point of being overdone but sadly virtually tasteless. The roast potatoes seem to have the taste and consistency of being reheated which was another disappointment. Top marks for the cooking of the carrots which were sweet, tender and full of flavour; the same for the french beans and sugar snap peas excellent care of these quick cooking veg. The rib eye steak whilst cooked beautifully cooked was pretty tough and unyielding and I kept looking longingly at the roast sirloin. I can only guess the cow that supplied the rib eye was stressed out and full of adrenaline at slaughter? A nice portion of tasty broccoli cheese but disappointingly cooked (reheated? chips. The 'hand pulled ' ? ale was cloudy and defo needs some TLC all in all pleasant lunch but nothing to write home about. Thank you to the chef for giving so much care to cooking the veg and the roast sirloin (but not for the pre prepared chips, roast potatoes and yorkshire puddings"

Rajpoot

Rajpoot

Half Moon Street, West Dorset, United Kingdom, DT9 3LN

Fish • Asian • Indian • Vegetarian


"I have been to this restaurant many times and always had a pleasant experience but last night my family were treated appalling by rude arrogant staff. We had not booked and arrived at about seven pm I thin I was recognised as I’d been many times before with my son, it was not full but we were asked to sit in front of the bar where takeaways were picked up and suggested the side room. Service was slow but we eventually got drinks and then eventually were asked if we wanted popadoms, we did and the waiter shot off before we found order mains and disappeared they eventually arrived and were good but we had been unable to order our main course. After a long wait after the popadoms we got to order and then the waiting really started we were totally ignored and saw no one for at least an hour when trying after a long wait to go to the bar to get more water and more drinks I was ignored. I appreciate the waiter was on the phone but afterwards disappeared. Meanwhile loads of takeaways were picked up and kept being brought out of the kitchen. Why take our business if too busy to actually serve us. I did after an hour ask if the food was coming as we had a 12 year old with us we’re getting tired and the wait ridiculous. I wax told ‘coming soon ‘ no apology no pleasantness, on the contrary the waiter seemed to go out of his way all night to be rude to us. Not once did anyone in all the time we sat there just come and apologise or ask if we were ok or needed more drinks etc most of us drinking water so just a jug refill when the food eventually came it was dumped down without a word not even to say what was what. The vindaloo was not authentically hot as I had asked it to be. My son has had it many times before there and the staff know and as I asked he does enjoy it properly spiced instead of made mild. We just wanted to eat and pay. The only time the waiter spoke to us was to tell me sister that she should leave either 15perceny tip or 12 etc he didn’t even ask if we had enjoyed our meal or apologise for how long it had taken. Just asked for a tip. Mr sister is a generous tipper but for probably the first time in her life didn’t want to tip just rudeness throughout the night that had ruined a meal that was close to £200 as there were six of us. She tried to compromise as she was embarrassed at the waiter telling her to tip and said she would round it up. The waiter became even more surly and told her not to bother. We left. No goodnight no thank you from the staff just what seemed to be either sneery silence or contempt and indifference. I had not seen that waiter before but I was embarrassed to have recommended it to me family. The good was good but the rudeness so appalling I would never go again and advise others to think twice they clearly couldn’t care less about their customers in the restaurant only getting the takeaways out the door. I rarely write reviews and have only ever written positive ones but it was appalling. My son was so upset as previously he has loved chatting to the staff and having them be impressed he can eat a vindaloo and now is confused as to why the man hated us so much and was so rude to him and his family"

The Duchess of Cornwall

The Duchess of Cornwall

12 Queen Mother Square Dorchester, Dorset DT1 3DD, DT1 3DX, West Dorset, United Kingdom

Pub • Bars • Steak • British


"The Dutches of Cornwall is an impressive looking inn in the slightly surreal environs of Poundbury, King Charles’ pet sociological experiment. It doesn’t have much competition in the immediate area and is or should be something of a flagship for the Hall and Woodhouse brewery that is based just up the road in Blandford. The setting, decor and general ambience are all excellent. The staff are youthful, smiley and mostly enthusiastic. The rooms are well appointed, comfortable and, particularly given the recent cold snap, warm and cosy. The bed and breakfast deal I got also represented fantastic value for money, particularly once you throw in the complementary drink from your room. What’s not to like? Well, we combined our overnight stay with Sunday lunch. It all looked promising. We, however, waited quite a while between being seated and being spoken to by waiting staff. “Sorry for the wait”. My pescatarian wife wanted the Hake. “Sorry, there’s no Hake left”. Our booking was at 1:30, not, I would suggest, late in the day. Not wanting fish and chips again , she opted for the No Nut Roast. I went for the Roast Beef ‘served pink’ . We perhaps confused the issue by ordering starters arancini and beetroot cured smoked salmon. Both were delicious. We then waited quite a while for our starters to be cleared. Eventually, my wife asked someone to clear our table. We then waited for our main courses. We waited. We watched other table’s mains come and go. We waited. We asked after our mains and moments later they appeared. ‘Sorry for the wait”. All looked Okay although my beef wasn’t pink. I tried it and it was a bit tough and beginning to dry out. Had I guessed, I would have thought they may have been waiting under a warming lamp for a while. We mentioned it to a waitress, who said she’d ‘tell chef’ and get me some more, pink beef. We waited. Unsure whether I should continue to eat my veg, I asked a waitress and she said to carry on eating I’d just be getting some more pink beef. Eventually, 4 succulent pink slices of rare roast beef appeared. Joy. When asked by the duty manager ? if everything was OK, the waiting, string of apologies and the over done beef were highlighted and he, again, apologised and kindly removed the cost of our main courses from the bill. Whilst I feel this was good and absolutely the correct response, I would clearly have rather have had a good meal served in a timely way the first time round. Breakfast looked promising but, again, a few items typically those we requested were unavailable. No baked eggs ? and no plain yoghurt. I am not sure who eats Toffee yoghurt at breakfast, of which there was a plentiful supply, other than, perhaps 6 year olds. It was also sad to see streaky rather than back bacon included in the Full English Breakfast and my bacon bap . Is this pandering to the American audience, do you think? A bit pernickety perhaps. Overall, a lovely stay was tarnished somewhat by some poor catering and a limited number of young staff who, whilst trying hard, lacked effective supervision; I would suggest that many of the delays we experienced could have been avoided by a good ‘maitre d’hotel’ or ‘floorwalker’ directing staff to clear away, prepare tables or identify when folk had been waiting too long. We would certainly give the Duchess of Cornwall another go if only for the exceptional value for money of the overnight stay and hope that the duty manager’s assurances that what we found was not representative of their usual high standards to be the case."

Bramble Cafe Deli

Bramble Cafe Deli

17 Buttermarket, West Dorset, United Kingdom

Cafe • British • Breakfast • Vegetarian


"Two weeks ago I had a very disappointing evening at the Bramble Cafe on a Make your own gin' experience. I did not want to publicly review this without giving time for Mat Follas Masterchef winner a chance to give an explanation so I...wrote an email to him. After hearing nothing for a week I telephoned to check if my email had been received. Mat answered the phone and very brusquely said he didn't know if my email had been received and without asking for my name said he would check and put the phone down on me. I can only surmise from his manner that my email had arrived but had not been well received. I allowed another week for a response but unsurprisingly have not received a reply. I would not recommend either the gin experience' or the food. It was terrible value for money and the total lack of customer care is lamentable. I find it very hard to believe the food we were served was cooked by a winner of Masterchef, he would struggle to win Come Dine With Me with this menu. My email to Mat is below: Dear Mat I attended the ‘make your own gin’ evening on August with great expectations as I thought it was a great idea. I had also heard good things about you from friends who had been foraging with you. Two of us attended the course with a view to returning on another date as a party of six as a birthday celebration for a friend. Having had a less than great experience I thought I would let you know and would be grateful if you could give me your views on the evening. The experience was meant to be demonstration based but with participants taking home a drink they had made themselves. It also promised a course mouth-watering meal. I didn’t in fact get to make any gin myself. However you gave a very interesting and informative talk about gin and I learned some things I didn’t already know. The food was not mouth-watering and certainly not what I would have expected from a chef of your calibre. I didn’t expect large portions but I did expect exciting flavours and finishing touches. Instead I received a series of dishes which I could easily have cooked at home. It started off well, the smoky tomato soup was lovely and the chilli gin complemented it well. The macaroni cheese was nice, but nothing out of the ordinary and seemed at odds with the bramble gin and Prosecco that was served with it. After that things went downhill. A single tiny chicken wing on a plate does not constitute a course of a meal. There was nothing served with it, no garnish, sauce or anything. It was certainly not a dish I would expect from a chef with your skills. The mussel ramen was the real lowlight of the meal. I have eaten ramen many times but never one quite like yours. The ramen I have had before comprised of noodles in a broth. The dish I was served on Friday was mussels in a dark brown liquid which looked and smelled unappealing. I ate the mussels because I was hungry but they were lukewarm and didn’t taste like fresh mussels. I had a taste of the liquid but I couldn’t eat it. It didn’t seem as though there were many clean plates going back to the kitchen so I don’t think I was the only one who found this unappetising. The pork was as disappointing as the chicken. Again it was served without any vegetables or jus, it was dry and the crackling was extremely salty. Again I ate it because I was hungry. The drinks service slowed down over the evening which didn’t help matters. The desserts were pleasant enough but a sharing platter usually consists of enough food for the number of guests and the portion served was only sufficient for one person. Similarly we had been promised bramble liqueur and limoncello for the end of the meal but a tiny amount of each between two people is not acceptable. I would be interested to know if this is your normal standard or if things went awry on Friday. Perhaps coming straight from a festival, cooking for other guests in the restaurant and also for the people upstairs meant your time and skills were compromised? I certainly felt cheated on the food front knowing that whilst I was eating tiny portions of uninspiring food you had cooked Beef Wellington for the people upstairs and the guests in the restaurant who weren’t on the gin course were being served generous portions of superior food. The evening felt very unplanned. From the information I was given regarding drivers being able to join at a later time I was led to believe the evening would start with some gin making by the course attendees. I am disappointed that I wasn’t able to make gin myself. Whilst you are a very nice man and i enjoyed listening to you, watching you put a few ingredients in a bottle for us to take home and eating a below average meal does not justify the high cost of the evening. I look forward to hearing from you."